Strengthening Teacher Learning Effectiveness Grant 1. Awarded to the district in 2012-13, the two-year $1,176,125 grant allowed the district to provide professional development to 46 te...

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3 GRANTS AT A GLANCE

Strengthening Teacher Learning Effectiveness Grant 1. Awarded to the district in 2012-13, the two-year $1,176,125 grant allowed the district to provide professional development to 46 teacher leaders and 6 administrative leaders. Helped pay for 6 part-time and one full-time instructional coaches.STLE Grant 2. Grant proposals were due July 22 for the year-and-a-half, $1,202,375 grant.STLE Grant 3. Grant proposals were due Dec. 2 for the year-and-a-half $1,213,625 grant for this school year and next.* The district was only eligible to receive either Round 2 or 3, and not both.Source: Carla Percia, Utica City School District director of grants, contracts and compliance.

The Utica City School District has missed out on two grant opportunities worth about $1.2 million each for teacher training and development after the teachers union failed to sign off.

"We're very disappointed," said Carla Percia, Utica City School District director of grants, contracts and compliance.

The money would not only have meant the continuation of a current grant for teacher development, but the additional hiring of about 16 full-time and six part-time teachers, Percia said.

And at a time when the district is facing financial difficulty, those extra positions could have been used to save the jobs of those employees likely to be cut from the expected 2014-15 budget shortfall.

Utica Teachers Association President Cherie Grant said she did not agree to the grant due in July because it was "incomplete" when she received it for review.

And she didn't sign off on the grant due Dec. 2 because teachers hired to fill positions left vacant by those participating in the grant-funded instruction would then be laid off once the money was gone.

"Longitudinally I didn't see enough benefit for my members, and quite frankly the bottom line regarding layoffs is that until the state adequately funds school districts like Utica, I don't believe that grants can make up the difference or fill the void," Grant said. "That's on the state."

Historically, all prior Utica Teachers Association presidents have been supportive of grants that would benefit students and teachers and always have signed off, Percia said.

The Strengthening Teacher Leadership Effectiveness Grant is part of Race to the Top money given to the state to distribute to districts to improve instructional practices in every classroom while targeting the highest-needs students, according to the state Education Department.

The Utica City School District was awarded a two-year, nearly $1.18 million STLE grant in 2012-13, with which the district was able to provide professional development to 46 teacher leaders and six administrative leaders.

"Any professional development you do is really aimed at enhancing teacher practices which in turn increases student achievement," Percia said. "Teachers teaching teachers is more effective."

When the state announced another $1.2 million in grant money was available through Round 2 of STLE, the district planned to apply, Percia said.

The grant, however, had to be signed off on by the superintendent and administrators' and teachers' unions — all of whom OK'd the grant proposal, except for the Utica Teachers Association, so the district was not able to submit the proposal.

"It was an incomplete application," Grant said.

Percia said the union was given as much of the proposal as was available at the time and asked if the district could do anything to address concerns prior to the deadline, and that Grant said no.

"That's on her," Grant said. "It's my understanding that when the grant application is provided to my office for review that it will come complete and that when she and I sit down after I've reviewed it she'll answer any (concerns)."

Page 2 of 2 - When Round 3 was announced, the district yet again aimed for the roughly $1.2 million state grant, which could be used for the rest of this school year and all of 2014-15. It was able to apply for Round 3 as it had not received Round 2--the district was only eligible for one or the other, not both.

The Utica Teachers Association, however, failed to sign off by the Dec. 2 deadline after all other parties did, including the school board.

"I do not object to incentives for professional educators, but the terms and conditions of those incentives need to be negotiated at the local level prior to the application being completed and moved forward for review," Grant said.

Her main objection was in the terms and conditions regarding the end of the grant, when the teachers with seniority who participated could get their jobs back and those hired to fill the spots would be once again laid off, she said.

Denise Dispirito, teacher leader and Elementary Academic Intervention Services facilitator, said the training has been immensely helpful and catered to the district's unique needs and it's something the teachers wouldn't have gotten if it hadn't been for the grant.

"They're hungry for strategies, they're hungry to learn how to use these modules," Dispirito said. "I don't think teachers will stop. It will just be more difficult for them to get it."